Chronicle of Arbela

Title(s):
  • Chronicle of Arbela
Period covered:
Early 2nd c.-ca. 550
Language:
Syriac
State of Preservation:
Partial
Genre:
  • Ecclesiastical history
  • Biography (collective)
Remarks:
The Chronicle of Arbela narrates the history of the bishops of that town. The only surviving manuscript was sold by the editor of the Chronicle, Alphonse Mingana, to the National Library of Berlin. Mingana (1908: x-xi) saysthat  he found the manuscript in the village of Ekrur, in Kurdistan. A paleographical analysis of the codex suggests that it is a modern copy. The text Mingana published in 1908 presents conspicuous variations in comparison with the text of the manuscript, among which a whole additional page totally absent in the codex (see Assfalg 1966: 27-29). Mingana must therefore have had at his disposal another, more ancient, manuscript, that he never mentions and that is now lost. Based on a bottom note to be found on f. 27v, he ascribed the chronicle to Meshiha-Zekha, East-Syrian author mentioned in Abdisho bar Brika's catalogue, but it has been proven that the note was added by a local scribe on Mingana’s own request (Jullien - Jullien 2001: 46; Vosté 1947: 517). These and other suspicious features brought Fiey (1967) to deny the authenticity of the whole text, saying that it is a forgery produced by Mingana himself. Fiey's case has been considerably weakened by Brock (1967) and his extreme position has not been followed by scholars. The authorship and the period of composition of the text, though, are still open questions, and doubts have been cast over its historical reliability (Brock 1992: 23-26; Jullien - Jullien 2001).
Edition - Translation:
  • P. Kawerau (1985) Die Chronik von Arbela (Corpus scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium, 467-468: Scriptores Syri, 199-200). Leuven.
  • I.L. Ramelli (2002) Il Chronicon di Arbela: Presentazione, traduzione e note essenziali. Madrid.
  • A. Mingana (1908) Sources syriaques. Volume One. Leipzig: 1-76; 76-168.
  • F. Zorell (1927) 'Chronica Ecclesiae Arbelensis ex idiomate Syriaco in Latinum vertit'. Orientalia Christiana 8: 143-204.
Fragments:
Users:
Bibliography:
  • J. Assfalg (1966) 'Zur Textüberlieferung der Chronik von Arbela: Beobachtungen zu Ms. or. fol. 3126'. Oriens Christianus 50: 19-36.
  • S. Brock (1967) 'Alphonse Mingana and the letter of Philoxenos to Abu 'Afr'. Bulletin of the John Rylands Library of Manchester 50: 199-206.
  • S. Brock (1992) 'Syriac historical writing: A survey of the main sources'. In: Studies in Syriac Christianity, ed. S.P. Brock. London: I = Brock, S.P. (1979/1980) 'Syriac historical writing: A survey of the main sources'. Journal of the Iraqi Academy: Syriac Corporation 5: 1-30.
  • M. Debié (2015) L'écriture de l'histoire en syriaque: Transmissions interculturelles et constructions identitaires entre hellénisme et Islam (Late antique history and religion, 12). Leuven - Paris - Bristol: 602-605.
  • J.-M. Fiey (1967) 'Auteur et date de la Chronique d'Arbèles'. L'Orient Syrien 12: 265-302.
  • W. Hage (1987-1988) 'Early Christianity in Mesopotamia: Some remarks concerning the authenticity of the Chronicle of Arbela'. The Harp 1.2-3: 39-46.
  • A. Harnack (1924) 'The Chronicle of Arbela'. In: Die Mission und Ausbreitung des Christentums in den ersten drei Jahrhunderten, ed. A. von Harnack. Leipzig: 683-698.
  • C. Jullien, F. Jullien (2001) 'La Chronique d'Arbèles: Propositions pour la fin d'une controverse'. Oriens Christianus 85: 41-83.
  • E. Kettenhofen (1995) 'Die Chronik von Arbela in der Sicht der Althistorie'. In: Simblos: Scritti di storia antica. Volume One, ed. L. Criscuolo - G. Geraci - C. Salvaterra. Bologna: 287-319.
  • I.L. Ramelli (2006) 'Il Chronicon di Arbela: Una messa a punto storiografica'. Aevum 80.1: 145-164.
  • E. Sachau (1915) Die Chronik von Arbela: Ein Beitrag zur Kenntnis des ältesten Christentums im Orient (Abhandlungen der Königlich Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften: Philosophisch-historische Klasse, 6). Berlin.
  • W. Schwaigert (1990) 'Miles und Papa, der Kampf um den Primat: Ein Beitrag zur Diskussion um die Chronik von Arbela'. In: V Symposium Syriacum, ed. R. Lavenant (Orientalia Christiana analecta, 236). Rome: 393-402.
  • J.M. Vosté (1947) ‘À propos du “Catalogue of the Mingana collection”’. Orientalia Christiana periodica 7: 514-518.